Green Party leader Zack Polanski has announced that he will not attempt to overturn a controversial motion passed by party members that officially classified Zionism as a form of racism, confirming that the stance will remain binding policy until at least 2028.
Appearing on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, Polanski explained that while he personally favors amending the language of the resolution, the internal democratic mechanics of the party mean that conference decisions must stand for a minimum of two years. He insisted that he would respect the democratic will of the membership rather than attempting to force through rule changes to override the decision.
The motion in question was adopted at the Green Party’s annual conference in Brighton earlier this month. It formally defined Zionism as an ideology dedicated to maintaining "an ethnonationalist Jewish state in historic Palestine to the exclusion and/or domination of the non-Jewish population." In addition to this definition, the text committed the party to advocating for "a single democratic state throughout historic Palestine," calling for a full arms embargo on Israel, and expressing an explicit institutional commitment to Palestinian liberation.
The passage of the resolution has triggered severe internal fractures and provoked widespread outrage across the broader political landscape. It has drawn fierce criticism from Green Members of Parliament, Jewish advocacy groups, figures within the government, and international partners within the European Green movement. The scale of the controversy also prompted the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the UK’s statutory equality watchdog, to formally write to the Green Party requesting further details regarding the policy and its potential ramifications.
The fallout from the vote cast a long shadow over the political standing of the leadership, directly affecting the final days of Polanski’s campaign in the Holborn and St Pancras by-election. Polanski ultimately finished second behind the Labour candidate, while facing intense scrutiny over his management of the internal debate and questions regarding his ongoing leadership.
Much of the internal criticism focused on the fact that Polanski abstained from casting a vote on the motion during the Brighton conference. The resolution passed by a margin of 1,022 votes in favor to 813 against. Critics have highlighted that this decision was decided by fewer than 2,000 voting delegates, representing a tiny fraction of the Green Party’s total overall membership, which stands at approximately 230,000.
